Comment: Travel’s travails and triumphs

Times are tough for many travel businesses but tougher still for some destinations, as we report this week on Tunisia's efforts to deal with the fallout from the massacre of holidaymakers in Sousse a year ago.

Orlando has suffered two unspeakable tragedies in as many weeks – we have the latest from the US on the outlook. And we report from the Greek island of Samos, which has suffered a calamitous drop in tourists since last year's refugee crisis in the Aegean.

Yet the news from Samos is improving, as it is for the market as a whole despite the uncertainty brought by the EU referendum and the distraction of Euro 2016.

While experiences will be mixed and some businesses will undoubtedly be finding life difficult, we report figures this week showing growth in the overall outbound market for bookings and departures.

Average prices appear to be up year on year, and the strong demand has come despite the well-publicised fall in the value of the pound this year due to uncertainty around the referendum.

Only in the past two weeks has market analyst GfK reported a fall-off in bookings, attributed to a lack of capacity in Spain and the western Mediterranean rather than to consumers delaying holiday buying.

Thankfully, by Friday morning the biggest source of uncertainty should be resolved because we will know the referendum result.

Whatever the outcome, the industry will go into late June off the back of a better-than-expected first five months of the year. Hopefully, business leaders have plans in place to deal with a possible Brexit – and planned investment, like that of Thomas Cook in its high street retail estate, will take place regardless.